We are living in a world of increasing changes whether in our environment or when we move to new territories. In business it’s well known that one of the tips is to break boundaries, to reach new markets. In education, internship and voluntary services are increasingly used as ways to help students come out of the comfort of the classroom.

I have observed Organizations like the US Peace Corps and the Korean International Agency in Cameroon and I have witnessed the power of working out of one’s comfort zone. Maybe President Kennedy did not know that by creating American agencies in foreign countries, the concept could impact so many other areas of life. With the coming of Globalization, we have a shift of movement from the South to the North and the South-South Cooperation.

The reality I have faced with other foreigners like me in Uganda made me understand many are not prepared to live out their comfort zone .Though there are numerous books on the subject, I would like to share my personal experience to integrate the Ugandan milieu with the hope it could help those who want to have an experience out of their comfort zone.

Study where you go. With the growth of new technologies, you can easily have an idea of the place you are going to before reaching there. If you know someone living there, you better ask questions about realities before landing. This applies in any situation where you have to move to a new job, city, group or voluntary position. Read about where you are going to and what you will do there.

Be goal-centered. You can write simple statements about what you are going to achieve in that new milieu. Use verbs of action to describe your goals and the expected results in a timeframe. This will help you face the desire to quit the place in a time of discouragement, pressure, stress, and depression. Goal-centered people enjoy moving out of their comfort zone because they have results to produce.

Integrate Social Groups. Universities, Churches, sport groups, Cultural events are good ways to integrate a new milieu. Out my comfort zone, I noticed that social groups help me meet other foreigners and I learned a lot from them. It’s also a good place to know how local people perceive foreigners and particularly how they perceive people from your country.

Learn the local language. Luganda is the main language spoken in Kampala. The truth is that, unless you show an interest in their language, local people will not integrate you. Actually, I made more friends when I broke the fear of making mistake in speaking. They are so happy when you ask them how to say a word or a sentence in their language. They really make you feel home.

Be aware of the cultural shock. I experienced my first cultural shock three months after my arrival. I had studied about it and knew it will come. But the difference between the theory and the practice is huge. Coming from a Socio-Capitalism background, I faced the shock of Capitalism in Uganda and I had to ajust to it to survive.

Understand the values. Values define what has priority in our life. According to C. terrier,values can be personnal (family,work,hobbies), republican (democracy,liberty,equality,solidarity) or religious. You can know your values or someones’ values by answering the question : “what is most important for me?” and ” what is more important for him/her?”.

Identify yourself. Identification is the process of thinking and behaving like somebody or a group because of common interest.It can means to dress, eat local dishes, share the same point of view on a topic,etc…

Communicate on your need for integration. Integration consist of being part of the life of a community. I had to explain to some relations that I would like to participate in their social and cultural activities before they started inviting me. Communication also means ask for people’s phone numbers. Sharing on social groups to enquire more about the community.

Accept that you are a foreigner. This is well known here in Kampala, life is more expensive for a “Muzungu” (foreigner). And one is easily identified as such even with all the effort to integrate groups. At the beginning,it was very frustrating but now, I just remind myself “you are a muzungu. Things could not be less different”…and I give an amount three time less than what was proposed…

Have fun! This is the last thing I am concluding my article with. I have learned how to have fun despite cultural differences between Cameroonians, Congolese, and Senegalese, different tribes of Ugandans, Burundi, Japanese, Kenyans, and Americans. We have a fun time sharing our differences on various topics. It helps relax and release the pressure of not being home. A good way to fight against depression!

You might not experience a comfort zone situation out of your country, but these tips can help you survive and become productive in any new milieu, job or situation. So take the step ahead and get out of your comfort zone to develop new knowledge, skills, and attitudes.

Read the next article in this series on https://seed4future.wordpress.com/2016/10/27/4-more-tips-to-succeed-out-of-your-comfort-zone/

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Bryon is a French language learner for middle intermediary level. During a French language test, he was asked to talk about his relationship with his neighbor. At that time, he wished he knew at least how they looked like so that he could answer: he realized that he had no relationship with the people around him. After the test, he went back home and started getting close to one of his neighbors; he later found out that they had a common interest for sports and the two became good friends.

This story reveals how some individuals could be distant from their neighbors and how social activities can change people’s minds and enable them build a healthy relationship with people around them. One social activity that could help us do that is learning a new language. The language class is a social group where language interaction should be close enough to reality. According to the new approach of learning a foreign language, class activities should be as close as possible to what learners encounter in their day to day activities. How does a language become a social representation of our real life?

The above pictures depict the neighborhood relationship diagram of two French classes on the topic “parler de son voisinage”.The diagrams shows the links between each learner and his or her immediate neighbors. As we can notice, learners knew little about each other and in each case they did not know their names. Students were asked to say and write in French what they know about their neighbors. Though the activity was in French, we could all notice that we didn’t know who lives near us. The learners acknowledged that they had never thought of trying to know about their neighbors except in the French class where it came to pass.

The difference between a good language learner and a poor one could be that the former relates to what he learns in real life while latter is learning the book to have good scores. Scores are good but if you can’t communicate on issues around you, then learning is a waste of time. How do you develop your competences with your environment?

The diagram below shows how a learner improves her vocabulary and grammar competences by writing the words attached to her university status.

After writing the words, the next thing was to construct at least three sentences with each of those words. You can imagine the numerous numbers of sentences she was able to construct around her environment. The next thing to do is to find someone with whom she could speak those sentences and improve on her pronunciation and accent.

As simple as it seems, it requires determination and a focused mind. It goes beyond what has been taught in the classroom even when the trainer did the activities around real life issues.

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The language class is one of the rare environments where unknown people meet for a short, long but intense period of interaction around common goals. With time, friendship can result of such interactions but also frustrations. Our interest in this article is what happens between the trainer and the trainee like in the examples below.

“I had an auntie who knew French yet none of her siblings could understand the language. So to keep them from reading her diary, she wrote all her private encounters in French. She spoke the language with so much passion that I made sure to learn French when I joined secondary school. However, my experience was not the best. The class so was large that the teacher always taught to finish the class rather than ensure that we understood. So when it came to dropping subjects, French was the first one off my list.

However, the love for the language stayed. I decided to give it another try at Alliance Française Kampala. My experience so far has been great and this I owe to the teacher student “chemistry.” (Student)

“During French classes, the trainee noticed that she was sad when the trainer did not come. She felt annoyed when he asked her a question and after some weeks, stopped coming to class regularly and complained that the trainer was in love with her that’s why he was asking her more questions than other trainees. When she was promoted to the next level of her class, she realized that the same emotional ties were happening with a female trainer so she started questioning herself. The only difference was that, she was not suspecting the female trainer to love her but still she was always happy to attend her classes.” (Language Trainer)

The two stories above relate to the same topic of this article: the transference mechanism during language classes. What is the transference mechanism? How does it manifest and is it possible to control it?

The transference mechanism is the affective link that grows in a relationship due to regular interactions. The affection can be positive or negative. When it is negative, it leads to frustration, complaints, negative views and misinterpretation of people’s actions. It’s what happened with the trainee and her male trainer in the second example above. When it’s positive, it leads to appreciation, admiration, and intense desire to be close to the other. That is the second experience of the trainee and the first narrative. This can be misinterpreted as loving the person (or being loved by the person) and every action can be misunderstood mostly in language classes, where a teacher appreciates a lot or is very kind toward a student of the opposite sex.

According to Psychoanalysis, the transference mechanism is unconscious, which means that we cannot control it. But we can be aware of it without explaining how it’s triggered. We can see its effects without understanding its causes. The interesting thing is that we can live with it without hurting ourselves or others. When the effects are well managed it can contribute to understanding who we are and, what type of persons attract us or are attracted by us. These are some ways to cope with the transference mechanism.

Reflect on what you feel. You can write down what you feel towards the person. It will help release the energy. Don’t make the mistake that many trainees often do by narrating their emotions to someone. It then spread like a wildfire in the class, then outside the class. It can damage the trainer’s image because you are confusing love, sex and transfer. Finally, it can leave you in confusion also when you will realize it was just a crush.

Be realistic. It’s good to make the difference between what we feel and what can be achievable. You will surely notice that the trainer appreciate every student that do well in an assignment, even people of the same sex. If you push your analysis further, why don’t you think the trainer is in love with student of the same sex as well?

Avoid contacts after classes. This is a good tip to help your emotional excitement calm down. Since it is the class contacts that create the emotion, it will come down after if you spend a long time without seeing the person. This include, avoiding personal whatsApp interactions, email, SMS, phone call (if you need help during your homework, ask a classmate or wait to get help while in class).

Be positive. Amazingly, transference can be transformed into good outcomes. You can be shocked by to see the type of person that can move your heart or leave you cold. Have fun with that….it’s part of being human.

You can read more on the link bellow about transference and its opposite mechanism, the counter-transference where it’s the trainer who has emotional attraction towards the trainee with the same manifestations.